Comments on: Clear Trumps Clever

By: Kelly

Kelly — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 21:26:49 +0000

My good buddy had this to say:

“It was a strange video clip for the environment – a bar scene. Not sure what to think of it. Sounded more like a party than a bad thing. Almost like “shit, you lost the bet, pay up” but nobody seemed upset or worried about erosion.”

She cracks me up.

By: Chad

Chad — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 17:32:57 +0000

Emailed it to a friend and her response was:

EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!
Not sure about the message they are trying to send. The message I’m getting is….never watch You Tube videos while eating lunch!

Tells me she got nothing worthwhile from watching it. I agree with Kelly’s comments about it being too fast. I had the volume turned up nice and high and I had to watch several times to catch all of the dialogue.

By: Katie Shaddix

Katie Shaddix — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 17:09:37 +0000

That was a fun experiment. I Gmail chatted four random friends with, “Watch this commercial and tell me what action the producers want you to take,” and these are the responses that I received:

Friend1: ummm, i have no clue. we’re trying to save storm water?

Friend 2: pretty much stop doing everything I’m doing…gardening, driving……

Friend 3: I get the impression I am supposed to be mindful of the chemicals that I use (and my dog leaves) when it rains. However, I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do to accomplish that. I think, wow, that’s gross that stuff is in the water runoff, but I’m not hearing how I can really help with that. I can guess ways, but I’m not hearing an explicit message. That’s what I get.

Friend 4: ugh,
not polute the streets
with fertilizer, dog poo, and other pollutants
cause you might end up drinking it at a bar?

Even the ones who understood what stormwater runoff was all felt like Pam’s friend above–it left them with no idea what to do about it (except maybe worry that they might drink it).

By: Pam Labadie

Pam Labadie — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 16:14:56 +0000

Here’s a response from a friend:

“It doesnâ€™t make me want to do ANYTHING. It informed me of what is in storm water runoff, but from there I donâ€™t really know what to do about it.”

By: Kelly

Kelly — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 14:33:19 +0000

Friend #1 did pretty well, I think:

“Okay, the ad is about how badly water gets polluted during a storm from runoff because of people’s littering (that includes litter and dog crap) and because the guy asked for it the other patrons got upset with him since it appeared to be his choice to have the water polluted by asking for the drink.

The producers want you to stop and think about how you’re damaging the water you use daily.”

By: Kelly

Kelly — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 14:04:56 +0000

I’m waiting to hear back from my two friends about their reactions. In the meantime, my own reaction is that this was way too fast, way too packed with split-second shots of important elements, to be really effective. I am stunned by the one viewer’s point that it looked like tapwater is filthy because it’s cycled through all that “crap,” so we shouldn’t drink it…OMG, I hadn’t thought that myself, but I can really see how it gives that message to the non-stormwater-related mind! I ended up thinking, okay, stormwater is bad, people pay for it, but so what?

All in all, this ad went for slick and ended up sloppy.

By: Beth Bodenstein

Beth Bodenstein — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 13:10:00 +0000

Cute ad, but I definitely see what you mean about not calling for action. It makes the viewer think storm water runoff is a bad thing, but has nothing to say about what they can do.

By: waterwordsthatwork

waterwordsthatwork — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 19:20:45 +0000

Here’s another:

“Uhmm…is there more to it than what it seems. I guess if it wasn’t for the end message (and the people groaning) I may have the impression that it’s acceptable to dump that stuff down storm drains. Or maybe it makes it seem that the tap water is nasty because it’s cycled from that stuff so don’t drink it. It could also just be trying to say keep the storm drains clean of the crap that you may throw in it. It really wasn’t as clear as it could be. Actually more entertaining than anything..”

By: waterwordsthatwork

waterwordsthatwork — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 19:18:34 +0000

Here’s a reply from one of my friends… she didn’t quite get it, did she?

“Great concept for getting the point across – the point being that we are asking for/supporting storm water runoff (which is gross) and we should stop because others dont like it… I guess the producers are asking me to stop asking/paying for storm water run off?

As an uninformed viewer I guess I would say I didnt know I was doing that.”